South Korea and the United Arab Emirates have reached an agreement to carry out a joint study on developing desalination plants for the Middle Eastern country, the finance ministry here said Tuesday.

In an economic cooperative meeting, South Korea's Finance Minister Yoo Il-ho and his UAE counterpart Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansouri signed a joint development agreement to carry out collaborative studies on researching energy-saving desalination plants and installing pilot models.

They also agreed to set up a joint steering committee to discuss ways to enhance cooperation in the water resources development and desalination sector.

The UAE is one of the world's biggest desalination markets as it eyes US$40 billion worth of desalination projects by 2020.

The two countries will hold a joint task force to cooperate in tapping into a project to build express train railways between Malaysia and Singapore.

South Korea and the UAE have held the minister-level economic meeting five times in order to strengthen bilateral cooperation in the energy, infrastructure and intellectual property sectors.

The Middle Eastern country is the second-biggest overseas construction market and fifth-largest oil exporter of South Korea last year. (Yonhap)